


If All Your Gravity Did Not Hit Me

by QuillAndInkWrites



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Autistic Caleb Widogast, Caleb/Fjord if you squint, Fix-It, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Healing, Jester/Yasha if you squint, Molly/Caleb if you squint, Mollymauk Tealeaf Lives, Nonverbal Caleb Widogast, Not Canon Compliant, POV Caleb Widogast, Resurrected Mollymauk Tealeaf, Sad with a Happy Ending, Sign Language, The entire M9 is there but these are the only characters that say 3 or more lines
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-25
Updated: 2020-09-25
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:34:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,586
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26646841
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QuillAndInkWrites/pseuds/QuillAndInkWrites
Summary: It has been a year and a day.Caleb knows this in his bones, in every waking moment, in every clock and every calendar.If someone asked him he knows that he would tell them the hours, too.The Mighty Nein return to Mollymauk's grave on the anniversary of his death and begin to heal.(Author was previously KTallent)
Relationships: Jester Lavorre & Mollymauk Tealeaf, Mollymauk Tealeaf & Caleb Widogast, Mollymauk Tealeaf & Yasha, The Mighty Nein & Mollymauk Tealeaf
Comments: 13
Kudos: 72





	If All Your Gravity Did Not Hit Me

**Author's Note:**

> (Title from the song Honeybee by The Head and the Heart)
> 
> This is because of episode 111. Please treat this so so so gently and kindly.
> 
> Long will he reign.

It has been a year and a day.

Caleb knows this in his bones, in every waking moment, in every clock and every calendar.

If someone asked him he knows that he would tell them the hours, too.

It has been a long year, longer still when he thinks about it in comparison to how long— 

No.

A week ago, Jester had asked him how long it had been. His fingers had stuttered as he carefully listed the months and the days. He’d hesitated as he thought of numbering the hours, and Jester had turned so very sad. His heart ached in time with hers because hers had ached in time with his first.

“Oh, Caleb,” she had cried, eyes wet, arms tight and warm and good around him. “I’m so sorry.”

Six days ago, Jester had asked the Mighty Nein what they thought about travelling North. Yasha’s face had crumpled and Beau’s had drawn up tight and Fjord’s had become blank before grief bled through to the surface.

“It’s been almost a year, hasn’t it,” Yasha had said quietly.

Jester only nodded.

They decided to go North the next day.

Two days ago, Yasha had seen purple flowers by the side of the road North and begun to cry even as she picked one to keep close to her heart.

Veth had asked if she would like to make a flower crown of them. To remember.

“A bouquet would be nice,” Yasha had said, “to leave—”

They all knew what she meant, and they all saw as she picked enough for a crown too.

Two days ago, as they’d lain down to sleep under the ever watching stars, Jester has whispered, “I miss him so much.”

Yasha had sat up, then, and shifted closer to Jester so that their thighs touched. “Me too,” she had said, and Jester had sobbed aloud, shaking.

Yasha took her into her arms and held her as they both cried, Jester clutching her just as tightly as she was wracked with sobs, and then Fjord sat up as well and scooted to sit next to them, tear tracks being birthed on his skin.

As the three of them sat together the rest of them had slowly sat up as well, in various stages of tears.

Caleb watched as Caduceus silently stood up and took watch just outside of the dome, gentle with their tears. He knew what to do when faced with grief.

Fjord gestured to Caleb and he slowly shifted over to sit by the six of them, their close huddle even closer now than for sleep. Fjord reached his arm out to put around his shoulders, a question in his face even through the grief, and Caleb leaned into his side as his own tears began to fall.

They all stayed like that for a long while, finding comfort in one another and finding comfort in grief. Fjord’s arm stayed an ever present pressure around him, grounding him and offering him wordless comfort.

At some point Yasha said, “he would give me the wildest looking flowers he could find,” with a wet voice and then the words came tumbling out of their mouths like a torrent of rain from the skies, natural and necessary and cleansing.

_ He carried his scars with pride _ , Beau said in a quiet, raw voice.

_ He braided my hair _ , Jester said.

_ He made jest of my old accent _ , Fjord said with a wet laugh,  _ and stopped when I asked him to. _

_ He loved us so very much _ , Caleb signed with gently shaking hands. Fjord took one hand and Jester took the other, with just the pressure he needed.

His hands stopped shaking, once they had something to steady them.

Funny how that worked for people, too.

One day ago, Jester finished the last card.

“I want to show him what I’ve done with what he started,” she had said.

“Would you read them for me?” Yasha asked.

First, Yasha was given the Ace of Swords, facing Yasha and facing away from Jester. Apt for her past, Yasha said.  _ Chaos and brutality were my past. No longer, thanks to all of you. _

Next, the Three of Swords upright.

_ Yes _ , Caleb thought,  _ that seems true. We are all the upright Three of Swords today, full of heartbreak and grief. _ He let his eyes become blurry just like Yasha’s, damp like the rain starting to fall from the overcast sky.

Just as the rain had started to pick up, Jester said that Yasha’s third card was the Six of Cups, facing Jester.

Happy memories. Familiarity.

_ Healing. _

Jester choked up again as she rushed to hide the cards from the rain.

Caleb had hoped that the cards were right. For Yasha’s sake.

Perhaps they knew something he did not.

The day after a year, rain pours down from the heavens, unrelenting and unceasing. They have all given up on the pointless notion of  _ keeping dry _ . Instead, they slog through the mud of the road with their horse and cart, shielding eyes against the rain in hopes of seeing a riot of colors through the unending gray.

Caduceus is the first to see any color, letting out an  _ ah _ and pointing with waterlogged fur forward into the wet and gray. The rest of them lean forward to see if they can make out the coat as well.

Jester makes a choked off noise and sits back on the bench heavily.

Then she is leaping off the back of the cart and  _ running _ .

Caleb scrambles off the back and slips through the mud and water after her, infinitely glad that he had taken his boots off on the cart because his socks were getting wet. He can hear the others tumbling out of the cart behind him, a wordless chase toward whatever had made Jester run.

Caleb sees Jester stop suddenly. Let out a pained noise.

He sees her staring forward into the torrent of rain.

He sees a purple Tiefling staring back at— 

_ Oh _ .

_ Oh Gott— _

_ This cannot be real, _ he thinks as he falls to his knees.

He cannot look up. If he looks up it will either be real or it will not. Both feel equally unbearable to him. He could not bear for it to be real because it could surely not be the truth.

Distantly, he hears Yasha say, with a heart wrenching voice,  _ Molly _ .

He hears Jester say, still sobbing:  _ Molly, is it really you? _

He hears someone with Mollymauk’s voice say  _ It’s really me, _ and hears his friends choke on sobs or cries or breaths almost all at once. He thinks he does too.

He still cannot look at this person’s face.

He does see their feet approach them all, bare and purple. He must have taken his shoes off. Mollymauk and himself had agreed on shoes.

“Caleb,” Mollymauk’s voice says, ever so gently.

Caleb lifts his gaze no amount. Keeps it steadily low. It is somewhat out of his control, he must admit, but his conscious and subconscious mind are mostly in agreement in the current moment.

“Caleb?” There is a purple hand drifting down to two feet from his face, clear even through the rain dripping down his face, reaching towards him just a little bit.

He has memorised this shade of purple. He knows it as clearly as the days since he had to remember it.

_ You cannot be real,  _ Caleb signs, and watches as the rain curves on his fingers. Still he does not look up.

Perhaps-Mollymauk crouches down just a little bit.  _ I’m real, Caleb, _ Mollymauk’s hands sign.  _ Look. _

Perhap-Mollymauk’s hands pause.

Caleb looks.

He sees— Well, he sees Mollymauk. He sees the gilded horns. He sees the purple hair, curling and soaked through with rainwater.

He sees Mollymauk’s gentlest smile.

_ Look _ , he signs again.

Caleb looks harder.

Sees—

_ Ah. _

He sees, in the uncovered middle plane of Mollymauk’s chest, a scar in the very center of his ribs. Twisted and pale lavender, almost the shade of the flowers Yasha had picked for him two days ago.

_ See? _ Mollymauk signs.

Caleb stands and Mollymauk stands with him.

Caleb reaches out shaking fingers towards Mollymauk’s chest, but does not touch the scar. Stays a few inches away, fingers shaking more than from what the cold could cause, salty tears mixing with clean rain.

Mollymauk slowly takes his hand.

( _ His hands stopped shaking, once they had something to steady them. _

_ Funny how that worked for people, too. _ )

Caleb falls into Mollymauk’s arms, shaking as he sobs. Mollymauk holds him tight and rocks them both ever so slowly, whispering words of comfort into his ear.

Jester cries through a soft  _ can I?  _ And Caleb nods his head just enough for Mollymauk to feel and pass on. Jester wraps her warm, strong arms around the both of them.

( _ —once they had something to steady them. _ )

Slowly, the rest of their friends join them. Jester lets go for just one second to hold both Mollymauk and Fjord, instead.

Caleb presses his face against Mollymauk’s shoulder, turning towards the juncture between shoulder and neck. Despite the rain he’s warm, running hot just as Caleb remembers.

Caleb lets himself be lulled by the cadence of the rain, the warmth of Mollymauk alive and holding him tight, the sounds of Mollymauk’s voice in his ear, and the breathing of his family around him.

It has been twelve months, one day, and seven hours, but finally Caleb can stop counting.

_ Funny how that works for people, too. _

**Author's Note:**

> New friend Gail tweeted a few doodles, including a doodle of the rainy hug! Ty Gail <3 [See her doodles here!](https://twitter.com/aguefortalumna/status/1310267565097152512?s=20)
> 
> kudos and comments are appreciated, not required. I would like to sit with people after this, though. I imagine we're both here for the same reason. We're here to grieve and heal too.
> 
> I love you all so much <3


End file.
